Among the proposals in 1825, a year prolific of projects, there is one
for a Joint Stock Company or _Society for the Encouragement of
Literature_; the capital to be £100,000. in shares of £25. to be
increased, if advisable; shareholders to be allowed to subscribe at par;
each shareholder to be entitled to a copy of every work published by the
society, at two-thirds of the publication price; interest 5 per cent.,
to be paid half yearly on the instalments subscribed; a deposit of £1.
per share to be paid on subscribing, the remainder by instalments as the
extension of the society’s concerns may demand; of the profits
one-fourth to form a fund for the benefit of authors, at the discretion
of the society; two-fourths to be divided among the proprietors
annually; the remaining one-fourth to accumulate into a perpetual
triennial fund, to meet unforeseen expenditure, the possibility of loss,
&c. &c. &c. There is not one word about the _Encouragement of
Literature_ beyond the title. This absence is the most intelligible part
of the proposals.
There was a _Society for the Encouragement of Learning_, established in
May, 1736. The duke of Richmond was president, sir Hugh Smithson,
(afterwards duke of Northumberland,) and sir Thomas Robinson, bart.,
were vice-presidents. The trustees were the earl of Hertford, earl of
Abercorn, Harley, earl of Oxford, earl Stanhope, lord Percival, Dr.
Mead, Dr. Birch, Paul Whitehead, Ward, the professor at Gresham college,
Sale, the translator of the Koran, and other really eminent men;
Alexander Gordon, the author of “Iter Septentrionale,” a “History of
Amphitheatres,” and other learned and antiquarian works, was their
secretary. In the December of the same year Gordon wrote a letter to Dr.
Richardson, master of Emanuel college Cambridge, soliciting his
interference with Dr. Conyers Middleton, to obtain for the society the
publication of the life of Cicero. “They have already entirely paved the
way for the reception of authors,” says Gordon; “appointed booksellers
for their service; settled the regulations concerning printers, and the
printing part;” and, “in fine _nothing is wanting but to set out with
some author of genius and note_.” Dr. Middleton chose to publish his
life of Cicero with a bookseller, notwithstanding an army of really
great names had made all those arrangements, and courted him to their
encouragement. In the outset of this society Mr. Clarke in a letter to
Mr. Bowyer expressed his conviction, that “it must be at last a
downright _trading_ society,” and said “I hope you will take care to be
one of their printers, for there will certainly be a society for
encouraging _printing_.” Mr. Bowyer took the hint, and printed for them.
The security was good, because each member of such a society is
answerable individually for its debts. At the end of three years “Dr.
Birch, as treasurer to the society, handed over to Mr. Stephen le Bas,
his successor in office, the astonishing balance of 59_l._ 3_s._ 9½_d._
During that period the society had printed only four books; and then,
deeming the assistance of booksellers necessary, they entered into a
contract for three years with A. Millar, J. Gray, and J. Nourse;
afterwards they contracted with six other booksellers, whose profits
they retrenched: then they became their own booksellers; then they once
more had recourse to three other booksellers; and finally, finding their
finances almost exhausted, they laid before the public a memorial of the
Present State of Affairs of the Society, April 17, 1748,” whereby it
appeared that they had incurred so considerable a debt they could
proceed no further.[21]
Less than fifty years ago another society existed, under the very title
of the Joint Stock Society proposed in 1825. Mr. Tyson, in a letter of
June 21, 1779, to his friend Mr. Gough, the antiquary, mentions that a
bequest of £5. was “left at the disposal of the _Society for the
Encouragement of Literature_.”[22] If the literature of the present day
owes its existence to that society, its offspring is most ungrateful;
the foster-parent is not even remembered, nor is the time of its birth
or death recorded in any public register. That it survived the bequest
alluded to, only a very short period, appears certain; for in the very
next year, 1780, Dr. Lettsom issued “Hints for establishing a Society
for promoting useful Literature.” The doctor, a most benevolent man, and
a good physician, dispensed much charity in private as well as in
public, and patronized almost every humane institution for the relief
and cure of human infirmity; and hence his eye was as microscopic in
discernment, as his hand was experimental in the healing of griefs.
Literature seems to have been to him as a gentle river that he rilled
into, and which he thought could be diverted, or regulated by new
channels and sluices; he appeared not to know, that it is an ocean of
mighty waters, with countless currents and varying tides. He proposed
largesses to indigent writers, and their widows and orphans, and
“honorary rewards” to successful ones. Robertson, Bryant, Melmoth,
Johnson, Gibbon, and many other “useful and accomplished writers,” were
to have had the “honorary rewards” of the encouraging society. Such
honours, such a society was to have forced on such men! The doctor’s
“hints” were not adopted, except that to relieve the casualties of minor
literary men, and their dependents, there now exists the _Literary
Fund_.
In the records of former days there is mention of a project for
extracting, bottling, and preserving sunbeams from cucumbers, for use at
that season when sunbeams are rare, and cucumbers not at all. The
projector seems to have inferred, that as cucumbers derived their virtue
from sunbeams, it would be virtuous in cucumbers to return the deposit.
Whatever virtue cucumbers had, it would not be forced. Experiment,
doubtless, disappointed hope; the promising project absorbed the capital
advanced, as completely as the cholicky vegetables tenaciously retained
the solar rays; and the deposit never found its way to the shareholders.
Any _Society for the Encouragement of Literature_, save one, is a
fallacy--that one is society itself. All interposition in its behalf is
feeble and doting interference. A public Joint Stock Company can neither
create literary talent, nor by divided efforts obtain so much; nor with
capital, however great, reward it so well, as the undivided interest,
industry, and unshared purse of the private publisher.
If a _Society for the Encouragement of Literature_ be instituted, when
more institution is threatened, and less institution is necessary, than
at any former period, such society will be a hot-bed for the cultivation
of little more than hopeful weeds. A few literary _shoots_ may be set in
warm borders, and drawn up under frames, to look handsome, but they will
not bear transplanting to open ground. Their produce will be premature,
of inferior quality, and not repay the trouble and expense of rearing.
If left unsheltered, the first chill will kill them. Weak _suckers_,
however well favoured, will never come to trees.
The monarch of the forest, in natural solitude, drinking sunshine and
dews, uninterrupted and untainted by human encroachments, and striking
deep root beneath virgin earth, attains, in fulness of time, to majestic
growth. In like manner the silent spirit of man, seeking peace in
solitary imaginings, penetrating below the foundations of human
knowledge, and generalizing and embodying the objects of sight and
feeling, arrives to a grandeur astonishing to men’s eyes, because not
the work of men’s hands. This self-created power, is denominated Genius.
In an incipient state it evaporates beneath the meddling touch, and at
maturity soars above its reach. Talent is ungovernable. It directs
itself, appoints its own trustees for uses, and draws drafts upon the
public which are honoured at sight. The demand for talent is greater
than the supply.
What is to be _done_?--nothing. What _can_ be done?--nothing. Literature
must be let alone. Under bounties and drawbacks, it becomes tortuous and
illicit.
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